Content Marketing Like a Pro

Content is all important with regard to a website and it should provide the information users are looking for. Google has always prided itself in attending to the needs of its users before anything else and keeps on tweaking its algorithms to identify the best content. Today, with the many algorithmic updates, Google has a very refined and complicated process of scanning the quality of the websites. Google’s strategies also keep business owners on their toes, persuading them to update their websites in keeping with the changing needs.

The otherwise important keywords and the number of links are not the only factors which decide a website’s position. In fact, nobody knows for sure all the criteria which are included in Google’s website ranking decision. Only those that are revealed to the public are the ones that are known. However, this is not all bad news. In fact, it serves all our purposes well, both as a user or as one who owns the website. If we are using it, then we can be assured that we will always see quality content. On the other hand, if we are the ones creating the content, now we know that there are no shortcuts and absolutely nothing can bypass quality.

It’s Quality that Matters

The importance that has been placed on quality not only forces everyone to concentrate on what they put up on their page but also makes them spend time on how they present it. In this article, we will talk about this burning topic of content marketing and learn how to excel in this area of the market.

From a business perspective, you get to enjoy excellent return on investment when you have quality content on your website. This is because if the content you put up on your web page is unique and more relevant than that of your competitors, then the traffic it will attract will definitely increase day by day.

The content you publish should not just be interesting and unique but it should also be something people want to read about or see. Besides, the amount of competition that you are fighting against can be huge. We all know that if we think of something, there is probably already someone out there with the same idea in the minds and they may beat you at the first chance they get. This is where the concept of content marketing comes into the picture. Some people use the term content strategy to describe the same thing. Content marketing is more simply understood as the process of having an idea, and then making and releasing it on the web. Content strategy, even though it is the same thing, is understood as a little more complex process with more steps involved in it which include not just having a great idea but also understanding the business goals and the audience you want to target along with measuring the voice and tone of your content and ways of advertising it.

Making Sure that Your Content is Good

Some ways of making sure your content is the best are:

Diversifying is the key: If you have a website and a large quantity of content, then quality improvement can be achieved by splitting the existing content into many small types which could include videos, blog posts, user generated content, animations, memes, press, data, and products and tools. This will not only make it more interesting for users to look into, but also make it easier for them to understand and recommend your content to others.

Have your eyes on ROI: Even if you open a website with the intention of helping people, appreciation from your followers matters a lot, and is an important factor when it comes to the way you view your future endeavors. Keeping a check on the returns you are getting on the investment you made to build and maintain the website is as important as making sure quality material is put up.

User is always the boss: The website is indeed your baby; however, the user or your customer is and will always be the king and deserves utmost importance. Understanding what people want to see is the first step in building any successful business.

Tools you can use to plan content marketing:

URL Profiler and Screaming Frog: To make sure you perform perfect audits of the content on your website, you need to keep track of all the URLs on your page. Several tools have come up which serve this purpose out of which Screaming Frog and URL profiler are easy to use. SEO Spider is the crawling tool that has been made available by Screaming Frog and does a great job of auditing the content. The uClassify API also has a readymade scoring system that helps you quantify the readability of your website.

Mural.ly: This is a virtual whiteboard that gives you several accessories to help conduct meetings with several people at the same time and come to a common decision. Some features include the function of adding post-it notes and images, and drag and drop option to bring in data from any source.

Storyboard That: When a lot of people are trying to make videos together, there may be many opinions regarding how they should look. This application provides several interesting features such as shapes, scenery and character assets which can be used to present your ideas on the same page as the others so you can together make the final product.

Balsamiq: This is a very interesting and famous wire-framing program that gives you several ideas in the form of layouts for microsites, new site sections, apps, and infographics. Using this, you can easily communicate your ideas about any topic to everyone and build majority on the final decision more quickly than other ways out there.

Gliffy: This application is also very similar to Balsamiq but it provides some extra features for workflow diagrams and documenting various processes.

Trello: This project management tool is very apt for building editorial calendars. A special feature called “Power-Ups” gives you a calendar view which makes your job much simpler.

Final Thoughts

The secret to building great content is having the perfect structure:

In today’s world, looks do matter. Having great content is only half the job done, unless you present it in the best way possible, people will still not look at it. So once you have found unique things to say about the topic you have chosen, you must take some more time to understand and decide on the ways to present it. Having a style guide for creating the content and then maintaining the same format for all the stuff you post on the website helps in making this happen in a very convenient manner.

Ways of finding new and innovative ideas:

The best way to understand what people want to be a part of is by actually making an effort to ask and know it from the horse’s mouth. The needs of the users can be understood by building their personas and studying them. This will help you in planning out what your company stands for and the targets it wants to achieve.